


all your worries will escape through the door

by AllTheNamesIWantedWereUsed



Series: Ghost!Strand [3]
Category: The Black Tapes Podcast
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Ghosts, Grief/Mourning, Heavy Angst, Past Relationship(s)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-07-18
Updated: 2017-07-18
Packaged: 2018-12-03 20:26:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11539824
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AllTheNamesIWantedWereUsed/pseuds/AllTheNamesIWantedWereUsed
Summary: Too long, he's been unable to speak, to touch, to communicate. Now he can, but at what cost?The final work in the Ghost!Strand series.





	all your worries will escape through the door

It’s been two hours, and Alex’s hands are still trembling, even closed around the mug of tea she’s holding.

 

“I know this is the millionth time we asked each other this,” Ruby says, “But did we seriously just see Dr. Strand, or some kind of apparition of him or-or something?”

 

“Either we’re all crazy, or yes,” Nic answers.

 

“Could’ve been a shared hallucination,” Ruby ventures. “We all miss him enough to-”

 

“No offense, Ruby, but I never knew Dr. Strand that well. I don’t really have the connection to him that you guys did, and I saw him right next to me,” Nic interrupts before adding, “I also don’t have that kind of imagination.”

 

“Not to mention the odds of a shared hallucination are almost impossible, and the scientific research on that is pretty incomplete,”Alex puts in. “Strand was usually hesitant to use it as an explanation.”

 

“He also said he’d go with the improbable over the impossible,” Ruby argues.

 

“I don’t know,” Alex pushes back. “That felt pretty real to me.”

 

“That's because it  _ was _ real.” Charlie's voice quietly comes from the kitchen counter, her words showing that she clearly does not possess her father's levels of skepticism. 

 

Alex still can't get it out of her head: the planchette spelling Strand's name, the lights flickering...Strand appearing inbetween Charlie and Nic. 

 

It'd been like looking through a gauzy veil. He'd looked distorted and urgent, and perhaps if she hadn't been so focused on his bright blue eyes, staring straight at her, she would've noticed the wound in his side sooner. 

 

He'd spoken one word. 

 

Her name. 

 

“ _ Alex.”  _

 

And then he'd disappeared, leaving them in a stunned silence punctuated only by shallow breathing. 

 

“Maybe we should try the ouija board again,” she suggests. “I don't think he could stay in our sight once everyone left the planchette.” 

 

“What, you mean like he lost power?” Nic asks.

 

“He disappeared once you and Charlie let go,” Alex points out. “It’s possible.”

 

Ruby drags a hand through her dyed hair. “This is all so fucking insane.” Her voice cracks.

 

Charlie puts a hand on Ruby’s shoulder. “Maybe we should go.”

 

A thrill of panic goes through Alex. They can’t leave; she needs them to try and find Strand again.

 

She wants to say,  _ “No, please, stay.” _

 

The words she says instead are very different.

 

“Yeah, maybe you guys should take a night, you know, relax and process.”

 

Charlie offers her a half-smile, looking more like her father than Alex has ever seen her look.

 

“Thanks, Alex.”

 

Alex tries to smile back, but it feels plastered on, like someone stitched a face that wasn’t hers on over her expression.

* * *

 

Nic follows the two women soon after, but not before making sure Alex feels okay.

 

“Do not try and do the ouija board alone,” he instructs.

 

She smirks at him.

 

“I won’t. I don’t think it’d work, anyway,” she adds, grinning at the way Nic freezes in the doorway. 

 

“Kidding,” she calls. “Go home, Nic.”

 

The door shuts behind him, leaving Alex alone in her apartment.

 

She doesn’t feel alone. 

 

She paces the apartment, calling for Strand in hushed whispers, hoping for some kind of sign that he’s still there.

 

Hours later, no ghost appears, save for her cat. The clock on her stove reads _ 4:37 A.M. _

 

There’s no point in trying to sleep, so instead she sighs, plops down on the couch, and pulls up Netflix, even though she’ll never focus on the show as she’ll be too busy thinking about earlier events.

 

Eventually, her eyelids slide shut of their own accord.

 

Two hours later, she awakes from a nightmare in a cold sweat and with a scream.

* * *

 

Darkness.

 

Twice now, Strand has succumbed to the black void of no light expecting the end.

 

Twice now, he opens his eyes and finds himself in Alex Reagan’s apartment.

 

If he’d never experienced  déjà vu before, he’s definitely experiencing it now. 

 

The ouija board lays discarded on Alex’s coffee table, the planchette in the same place as before.

 

Everything is the same as when he left.

 

He’s unsure if that comforts him or not.

 

Alex stands at her counter, blearily loading coffee into her French press. She doesn’t bother heating any water, just fills it from her tap. She most likely intends to microwave it later. The watch he gave her still glints on her wrist as she puts bread in the toaster and pushes the slot down. 

 

She stares at the toaster, lost in space and thought until her prize pops back up, thoroughly and mistakenly blackened.

 

She slathers it in butter and bites into it anyway, pushing down her French press handle with her free hand, then pours herself a mug of coffee, and knocks it back, tepid blackness and all, shuddering as she does so.

 

He should try and manifest again, try to talk to her.

 

Later, he decides as she yawns, swaying a bit. She won’t think of him as anything more than a sleep-deprived hallucination. 

 

He curses himself for ever being irritated every time she displayed her will to believe. He’s tainted her, it seems, with his own skepticism and demons. 

 

He’d give anything for her to have that bright-eyed belief right now.

* * *

 

The longer that ouija board sits there, the angrier Alex gets. 

 

It’s completely irrational to be this angry at a piece of wood with paint on it, and yet…

 

She tells herself that the stupid board is the reason Strand faded, that the stupid planchette is a piece of wooden shit, that the information she got off those websites is bogus-

 

It’s easier than being angry at Ruby, Charlie and Nic, at herself, even.

 

At 2:16 P.M, the dam breaks and she swipes the entire board off the table. It crashes to the floor, scaring Ghost and the planchette goes skittering across the floor and hits a wall. 

 

Her fingernails dig into her scalp as she grabs at her hair, almost ready to tear it out because she doesn’t know what to do; what the hell is she supposed to do after something like that happens-?

 

“Alex.”

 

She shrieks and whirls around, and comes face to face with Richard Strand. She staggers back, eyes wide.

 

Her voice seems to stop working as all she can do is gape at him.

 

He looks so different.

 

He has the barest hint of a five o'clock shadow, nothing like the scruff he had when he left, and he’s dressed in jeans and a flannel, also rather unlike the last time she saw him.

 

The dark spot in his side, the shirt wet with blood, is definitely new. 

 

She can’t hear anything other than her own heartbeat pounding in her ears, and her own panicked breathing, at least not until he speaks again.

 

“Alex? Can you hear me?”

 

Just hearing his voice brings tears to her eyes.

 

“R-Richard?” she chokes out.

**Author's Note:**

> Comment/kudos, please!


End file.
